1. Introduction

Introduction

In March 2020, the Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) announced the testing of a new cybercrime reporting program developed through a joint initiative with the Canadian AntiFraud Centre. Anticipated to launch to the public in 2023, the goal of the new online reporting system is to increase police knowledge, tracking and investigation of online crimes through an enhanced reporting system (see RCMP 2021). This initiative is only one piece of a larger public investment by the Canadian federal government at responding to cybercrime that includes sizeable funding for strengthening collaborations between national and international law enforcement, producing actionable intelligence on cybercrime, and creating new policing response units.

While such investments are much needed, what have not kept apace are research and evaluation of existing cyberpolicing efforts and strategies. Nor, until relatively recently, have we seen significant public investments aimed at developing and testing innovative, evidence-based approaches. Thus, borrowing from the language of evidence-based policing, when it comes to cyberpolicing, we know very little about ‘what works’ (Sherman 1998; Sherman et al. 2002). This is particularly the case in the Canadian context, as detailed in this paper.

To develop a program of Canadian-based cyber-research that will inform sound public policy and practice entails a deeper understanding of the strengths and limitations of the current research evidence base. To that end, we have conducted what will be the first in a series of evidence assessments on research into cybercrime-related topics. Therefore, in this paper, we present a scoping review of the Canadian research literature on cyberpolicing, intending to answer three important research questions:

RQ1: What is the nature and scope of Canadian cyberpolicing research as represented within peer-reviewed journals over the past 20 years (2001-2021)?

RQ2: What is the nature and scope of Canadian cyberpolicing research as represented within the ‘grey literature’ over the past 20 years (2001-2021)?

RQ3: What Canadian cyberpolicing topics are missing from the literature?

Table of Contents

• Introduction
• Method of Inquiry
• Findings
• Conclusions and Recommendations
• Acknowledgements
• Appendix I - List of Peer-Reviewed, Published Canadian Papers on Cyberpolicing Topics (2001-2021).
• Appendix II - List of Grey Literature on Cyberpolicing Topics (2001-2021)
• Appendix III - List of Topics Based on ASC presentations (2005 ³ - 2021 ⁴).
• References